MEDIA RELEASE

Family First’s Jane Foreman says Premier Ben Carroll promised Victorians a new direction “all about integrity”, and seventeen days later has brought Parliament anti-corruption laws with a clause that keeps IBAC away from the Big Build, which is not a new direction but the same government with a new man in front of it.

The Age and the Herald Sun reported last night that Labor’s IBAC legislation will bar the watchdog from applying its new powers to any matter it has already investigated, declined to investigate or referred to another integrity agency. The carve-out covers the Big Build corruption allegations former premier Jacinta Allan referred to IBAC in July 2024. IBAC assessed that referral and found it outside its jurisdiction at the time.

“Labor is broadening the definition of corruption and then writing in a clause that stops IBAC using it on the one referral we know it had to turn away,” said Mrs Foreman.

“That is not a reform. It is a locked door with a new handle on it.”

On 22 August Mr Carroll told a Labor gathering that he had been clear since day one that his government was taking “a new direction that is all about integrity, keeping communities safe, and making every dollar count”. In the same speech he said, “this is a Labor Government”.

“He put integrity first on his own list. Seventeen days later Victorians can see what he meant by it,” said Mrs Foreman.

“He told that room it is still a Labor Government. This Bill is the half of the speech he meant.”

The Bill is due in Parliament this week, and both the Coalition and the Greens have threatened to withdraw their support.

“There is not much the Liberals and the Greens agree on,” said Mrs Foreman. “They agree that this Bill has been written to protect the government.”

IBAC can currently only investigate conduct that would be a criminal offence punishable by five years’ jail. The Bill widens it. Then it says the widening does not reach back.

“Nobody is arguing against the royal commission. But a royal commission reports and goes home. IBAC is meant to still be standing afterwards.”

“The Premier says no shortcuts and no excuses. A clause writing the Big Build out of his own corruption laws is both.”

“A secret levy on every train fare for twenty months. Cabinet papers that surfaced three days after a pothole promise. Now a watchdog handed new powers with the past written out of them,” said Mrs Foreman.

“This is not one bad clause. It is the pattern, and this Premier has been at the table for all of it.”

“The Premier can fix this today. Take the clause out and let IBAC use its new powers on the Big Build.”

Mrs Foreman says Victorians get two votes in November. One changes the government. The other puts Family First in the Legislative Council, where a bill like this one has to pass.